


God Knows, You've Got Me Sewn

by baby-be-with-me-so-larryly (Things_he_cant)



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Bakery, Fluff, M/M, larry stylinson - Freeform, lol idk if it counts as fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-10
Updated: 2013-12-10
Packaged: 2018-01-04 04:10:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1076377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Things_he_cant/pseuds/baby-be-with-me-so-larryly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis is oversized sweaters and sugarless tea and he's a mess, really, and he may or may not be a little bit too gone for the green-eyed boy with stars in his eyes and stars in his smile. Self-indulgent Bakery!AU, also feat. Zayn because brotp, Niall because sunshine personified, and Liam because everyone loves Liam. (P/S A slightly more teasing Harry, because I've always liked the idea of little Louis getting all flustered when he's alone with his boy, oops)</p>
            </blockquote>





	God Knows, You've Got Me Sewn

**Author's Note:**

> Hiiiiiiiiiiii, this is my first ever published fic, so, you know, be gentle.

It's 5 in the morning and Zayn and Liam are bickering over the toaster, of all things, and Louis thinks that he may or may not need new friends, but not really.

He thinks that his eyeballs might fall out from their sockets soon, he might be developing blisters on his fingertips, and when he hears the toaster topple over the kitchentop and Zayn and Liam's simultaneous yelps of _"fuck!"_ , he thinks that he may or may not need to move out from this shitty flat, but not really.

It's 5 in the morning and he really should be going to bed, but the thing is his inspiration for writing has an even more fucked up sleep schedule than him, and if he foolishly abandons them to go to bed, they have the tendency to abandon his brain when he wakes up in the morning too, so going to bed is not too favourable of an option.

There are cracks in his bedroom walls and cracks in his life too, maybe, but there isn't a crack on his trusty little laptop that is his livelihood, and Louis might be able to live with that.

Louis feels his stomach growl and he debates whether to go into the kitchen and brave the mess his flatmates have no doubt caused, or pack his laptop in his backpack and brave the weather that has turned slightly chilly, and decides on the latter. He might go insane if he had to tame his tummy with burnt toast courtesy of Zayn at 5 in the morning for one more bloody time in his life (Louis can't cook for shit, and if you think that people who can't cook for shit should at least be able to work the toaster, well, Louis ain't hearing any of your incorrect opinions, you uncultured swine.)

So Louis stuffs his laptop into his backpack and pads out into the living room, as Zayn pops his head out from the kitchen.

"Heading out?"

"Yeah, feeling a bit peckish."

"Oh, are you getting food, then? Would you mind buying something for me and Liam? We  _might_ have broken the toaster." He had the nerve to  _laugh,_ that little shit.

"I'm thinking of doing some writing someplace else, might be a few hours before I'm back. And fix the toaster you wanker, he's my best friend."

***

Louis regrets his decision immediately as he starts walking along the sidewalk. It's 15 degrees Celsius, he's only got a sweater on, and he hasn't got a destination in mind. He's pretty sure there wouldn't exactly be any shops open at bloody 5 in the morning, either. Oh, and he's definitely speeding up his footsteps because of the way the wind is blowing at him, causing him to shiver, and definitely  _not_ because of the ominous way the streetlights are flickering.

He speeds up his footsteps a little bit more as he rounds a corner, and he must have done more good in his life than he's let on, because there's a little bakery just sitting there like an early Christmas gift, not too far away from him. There isn't a sign on the door that states that it's open, but the lights are on, and it looks so lovely and inviting and cosy and warm and Louis' tummy is rumbling so hard that honestly, he wouldn't exactly care if there was an axe-murderer inside just waiting to chop unsuspecting customers at 5 in the morning into tiny pieces for the Shepard's pie.

So Louis opens the door of the bakery and what greets him is the loveliest, most Christmassy, most  _homey_ smell that's ever hit his nostrils ever since he left his family in Doncaster, and the boy with blond hair that's snoring obnoxiously with his mouth hanging open on one of the booths doesn't exactly look like an axe-murderer, either. He looks like a rather lovely person, actually, despite his loud snoring. So Louis steps inside and closes the door.

The blond boy stops snoring abruptly, closes his mouth, and opens his eyes. His eyes are blue and kind and warm and Louis decides that he likes this kid.

"Hi, are you a customer?" Louis asks.

"Nahh, mate. Just accompanying our little baker boy, wouldn't want him to get lonely at 5 in the morning and take out his frustrations on our bread." The boy has a thick accent and his words are slightly slurred and he yawns and stretches and he's wearing a sweater with a cartoon reindeer on it and Louis decides that he might as well start making new friends now. "We don't usually get customers so early in the morning, why don't you sit while I go check on the kitchen?"

Louis' stomach rumbles a little too loudly as he slides into a booth and the blond kid either doesn't hear or doesn't care as he walks pass the counter and into the kitchen, stretching his arms over his head.

***

"And he just shrugged his shoulders and  _went on with what he was doing!_ Can you even believe that fucking kid, mate?" The blond kid, who introduces himself as Niall, is slapping his knees as rumbles of infectious laughter bellows from his chest, and Louis is laughing and trying not to snort tea out of his nostrils in front of someone he's just met 30 minutes ago. He really should continue on his writing, but that kid was just so upbeat and  _likeable_  andapparently every bloody thing is hilarious to him and Louis is pretty sure the kid knows how to work a toaster just fine, unlike those two assholes at home, so he tries to be good at that whole Socializing thing. It isn't hard, Niall provides most of the conversation and raucous laughter, and Louis doesn't even have to try to laugh as Niall goes on and on hysterically about everything under the sun. He's been dishing about their baker for 15 minutes now, after he's told Louis about this bakery being his late mother's business, and how he's so glad that he's found a baker that actually lives up to his mother's standards. That kid must bloody adore him, Louis thinks.

Louis' tummy growls even more furiously than before and he remembers that the point of him trudging through the cold was to get some bloody food and a peace of mind to write. 

"Oh!" Niall stops his laughter and raises his eyebrows in realization, "I'm sorry, mate! Bloody perfectionist, that stupid boy, wouldn't _dream_ of letting customers set eyes on his babies before everything is perfect. You would think that  _he_ was the one who grew up surrounded by pastry!"

Somehow this tickles Niall in some incomprehensible way too, as he's laughing as he makes his way into the kitchen again.

Two minutes later and Niall is somehow balancing four baskets of bread with two hands as he makes his way to the shelves and arranges the baskets. He walks back into the kitchen and appears with four more baskets, this time with another person right on his tracks.

Another Person is balancing  _five_ trays with various pastries on them with his abnormally large hands. He's got these chocolate curls and there's a bit of flour in them and he's too far away for Louis to tell the colour of his eyes but they fucking _sparkle_ from a distance and  _is this real life or is this a bloody fanfiction_ (not that Louis has read any, of course.) _  
_

"Hi." He lowers his head to Louis and flashes a smile and _are those fucking dimples_  and  _fuck,_ when did he get so  _close?_ "Would you happen to be the ravenous customer that my lovely friend here has told me about?" He's got a deep drawl-y sort of voice and now that he's close enough Louis can make out the colour of his eyes. Green, like emerald, but oh so much prettier.

"Yeah," He did not fucking  _squeak,_ "I would be the ravenous customer in question, yes."

Another Person has a cackling laugh, Louis finds out the next second, and he sends a silent thank you that neither Zayn or Liam are here to witness as he literally flounders around for words and  _fuck Niall Horan for not casually giving him a heads-up that Baker Boy is the Devil's incarnate, sent here on Earth to destroy Louis' life._

"So, aren't you going to find out if I'm good with my hands, then?" Louis widens his eyes almost comically as the innuendo hits him. "Today's special turned out to be pretty brilliant, if I do say so myself."

And with that, Baker Boy flashes Louis another smile and  _bloody dimples, mate_ and he's somehow already gotten all the trays on display on the shelves and he's on his way back into the kitchen.

Louis suddenly wishes that the bakery was in fact hiding a murderer after all, and he was now being consumed by an unknowing customer as minced meat in a Shepard's pie.

He very much wants to leave this stupid place and the stupid boy with the stupid face, but his tummy is protesting so he walks over to the shelves and checks out the Daily Special section. Oh, he chose to check out the Daily Special section entirely on his own will, by the way. Displayed on the shelf is a cake that's half black and half white, so it looks sort of like a zebra. It looks innocuous enough so why not? Louis thinks as he calls out to Niall that he wants a piece of that cake. He throws in two scones into his order too because he's  _famished,_ and a cheese bun because cheese.

He sets down his tray on the booth he's previously occupied, and starts off with a scone and it's so buttery and the  _smell_ of it and the cheese bun is  _GAH,_ okay, Louis takes back his wish of being chopped into pieces by an axe-murderer because damn, this shit is worth living for.

When he finishes the scones and bun he eyes the piece of cake warily, it's going to give him a bloody foodgasm on the spot, he's sure of it.

He picks up the fork and scoops a tiny piece of it into his mouth and Louis thinks he might be in love. With the cake, obviously, not the maker of the cake. Or the hands of the maker of the cake. Or anything that has to do with the maker of the cake. Just the cake.

He slices a bigger piece and shoves it into his mouth and closes his eyes and no, of course he's not pressing his lips together to hold back an embarrassing moan because who the fuck moans over food?

"Enjoying yourself, I see."

Louis opens his eyes and it's that stupid boy again. With his stupid, stupid hair and stupid, stupid, pretty, pretty eyes and an innocent smile with _dimples_ that does not match his suggestive sentences, not at all. But Louis is almost 22, not some 13 year old with a stupid crush on the school jock. Boys with stars in their eyes and craters on their cheeks aren't fooling him, not at all.

"Hmm," Louis shoves another piece into his mouth and scrunches up his nose, "It's okay I guess."

Baker Boy barks out a laugh again, and Louis thanks whoever that's looking down upon him that 10% of the snarkiness he usually reserves for Zayn and Liam is still present, because unlike Zayn and Liam who would no doubt reply with a swear, his snarkiness could make Baker Boy's dimples pop like that. Yeah, like  _that._ _  
_

Baker Boy stops laughing. "So, compliments to the chef, then?"

"Okay, compliments to the chef."

"Harry."

"Okay, compliments to the chef Harry."

_Harry._

Okay.

Baker Boy's name is Harry.

Harry _Potter_ may or may not be Louis' teenage crush.

Maybe he's just got a Thing for British boys named Harry, who knows.

Harry's looking at him expectantly now, what in th-  _oh._

"Louis." He tries his darndest to appear nonchalant as he shoves another piece of the cake in his mouth, he really does.

"Okay, Louis." He's got that stupid smile again and  _why is he so smiley_ and Louis is pressing his lips together again, and no of _course_ he's not pressing his lips together to hold back a smile.

He fails miserably, because he's a loser like that.

So Harry and Louis end up looking at each other with identical shit-eating grins on their faces and Louis doesn't even know Harry's last name and wha- oh, yeah, Tomlinson, right, he still remembers his last name, of course.

"Oi, get your ass over here, I need help with yesterday's account. And stop flirting with my customer, you wanker."

The thing is Niall has kind eyes and is funny and cheery and he wears reindeer sweaters but Louis honestly feels like strangling that little shit right now, is what it is.

So Harry pads off and Louis sets his laptop on the table and does his thing. The tea that Niall had so kindly offered him just now has gone far too cold for Louis' liking but hey, it's cold outside and it's warm inside and it's warm in Louis' chest and stomach and it's been so long since he's felt this warm in his chest and stomach and he finds out at the age of 21 that cakes are dangerous and boys with dimples and stars for eyes are even more dangerous and the universe might be against Louis, maybe.

***

So this becomes a Thing for Louis, him type type typing away on his laptop at home till around 5am, and rounding the corner a few streets away from his shitty flat to visit the bakery. And it has 100% to do with the fact that they sell orgasmic pastries, and absolutely 0% to do with the fact that a boy with a stupid face and stupid voice works at that particular little bakery. Maybe it's because the owner of the bakery who wore reindeer sweaters on the day of their first meeting wears different sweaters with different cartoons every day, who knows.

A sweater with a cartoon reindeer, a sweater with a cartoon Santa, a sweater with a cartoon Christmas tree, a sweater with a cartoon snowman, a sweater with a cartoon candy cane, and a sweater with a cartoon depicting two bells later, Louis walks into the bakery, expecting to see a new sweater, but is greeted with no sweater and no blond boy with blue eyes and a loud laugh.

"Niall?" Louis calls out and walks closer to the kitchen, "Harry?"

"Louis?" He hears Harry's voice call out from the kitchen, "M'here, come in."

 _Fuck,_ they're alone together, and Louis doesn't know if he would like to strangle Niall or kiss Niall the next time he sees that little Irish shit.

He decides on neither, and walks into the kitchen. He's just opened his mouth to call out a greeting but his left elbow decides to get a life of it's own at that moment and knocks over a bowl with dough in it that's set on the counter and Louis shrieks an "Oops!" just as Harry lifts his head to say a "Hi" and okay,  _that's_ why Zayn and Liam don't exactly approve of Louis being in the kitchen, because his elbows have lives of their own.

" _Fuck,_ sorry, sorry," Louis flusters as he kneels down to pick up the bowl and the lump of dough lying on the ground. "I'm shit in the kitchen."

"Yes, that I can see." Louis can  _hear_ his stupid grin, that's the thing.

"I'll just," Louis sets the bowl and dough on the counter and lifts his palms up in mock surrender, "I'll just leave this here and leave, yeah? I'd just mess up even more if I stay in here any longer, I'm sure."

Harry's eyes widen almost comically and Louis heartbeat does _not_ speed up like a fucking bullet train as Harry actually looks  _flustered,_ for a change.

"No! No, no, it's okay." He's biting his lower lip and what even is air and - "Stay."

So Louis stays.

Louis' been meaning to finish his writing today, but Harry hums when he bakes and his biceps flex when he kneads dough and his eyelashes flutter when he looks down at his hands doing the work and he punctuates their conversations with his laugh and occasional smiles directed at Louis and,  _Harry,_ so, you know, what's the hurry for writing, anyway.

"Where's Niall, anyway?"

"He's got a bit of a cold, I think, so it's just you and me today."

And his hands continue kneading the dough but he lifts his head and smiles at Louis and  _what did Louis do wrong in his past life to deserve this._

"Okay, just you and me."

So Louis stays in the kitchen and watches Harry as he moves around. And they talk, they talk, they talk a lot. And Louis finds out things about Harry that he hasn't told him when it was the two of them and Niall, because Niall practically knows everything about Harry. He finds out that Harry, like him, is alone in London without his family, but he, like Louis, has a shitty flat and an asshole for a flatmate (namely, Niall) and that more than makes up for it, really. He finds out that Harry likes his tea with two sugars, please, he finds out that Harry's favourite movie is Love, Actually ("It's a Christmas classic!" "Yeah, and so is The Grinch."), he finds out everything about Harry, because that stupid boy is just so open like that and he wears his heart on his sleeve and, yeah, Louis might really like someone who wears his heart on his sleeve.

***

Louis walks back to his flat at 9am because as much as he wants to stay in that damn bakery all day, customers were filling in and Niall is not around and Harry has to tend to the till and his eyelids are drooping and he's not going to get any writing done, anyway, so he walks back.

He opens the door to an empty living room, Zayn and Liam must be sleeping. He drops his laptop bag on his table and sleeps, too.

It's near 7pm when he wakes up, and he walks into the living room with Zayn doing his thing with his brush and Liam doing his thing with his guitar and the two are not bickering, for a change, so Louis sits down on the sofa.

"So, tell us, my dear friend." Zayn says as he continues painting on his canvas,"Wha- _who_ is it about that bakery that you visit every day that's got your panties in a bunch, huh?"

"I haven't got my  _panties in a bunch!"_ _  
_

"Yeah, and my tattoos are all sprayed-on, so spill."

Liam actually stops strumming on his guitar to look at Louis, and Zayn stops painting with his brush to look at Louis, and Louis is looking at the both of them, and he realizes that there's no way he's getting out of this, so spill he does.

Louis finishes and there are identical shit-eating grins on Liam and Zayn's faces and Louis isn't sure if he's actually left his parents back at Doncaster because the next sentence that comes out of Liam's mouth is "So when are we going to meet him?"

He  _really_ needs new friends.

"You won't get to  _meet him,_ because it's just a stupid crush on a stupid baker who works at a stupid bakery, we're not getting  _engaged,_ he might even be  _straight_ for crying out loud! It's not like I've asked him point-blank before, so there's that."

And there's that.

But at half past 5am Louis finally gives up because what even is the point of pretending, anyway, and he packs his laptop into his bag to sniggers from Zayn and Liam and he definitely does not huff at them as he walks out of the door. And his heartbeat definitely does not increase as he steps into an empty bakery once again.

"Louis?" Harry's voice calls out from the kitchen.

So Louis walks into the kitchen to find Harry kneading on a lump of dough and Louis really doesn't know what's the _point_ of it all if Harry keeps smiling at him like that. Like he's the sun, Harry's sun, to be exact. Like he could just light up a room and light up Harry's _eyes_ just solely by his presence and Louis thinks that he just might be a little bit too gone for this boy if his mind keeps playing cruel and horrible tricks at him like that because _why in the world would he be Harry's sun, anyway?_

"Hi there." His eyes are doing that  _thing_ again, good god.

"Hi yourself." Okay, appropriate amount of nonchalance.

"You're late today." _  
_

"My flatmates were being assholes." Truth.

"Were they?"

"Yup."

"Could you do me a favour, then, Lou?"

"Depends on the favour."

"Please ask your flatmates to not be assholes again."

"Because?"

"Because I need my daily dose of Louis on time," He stops his kneading and wipes his flour-y hands on his jeans and looks Louis right in the eyes and  _fuck,_ "I might get a really severe withdrawal if I don't, wouldn't want that, would we?"

Louis feels a lump in his throat because,  _okay._ "Of course we wouldn't. I'll convey the message to them, first thing when I get home."

And he smiles that smile again and  _what even is the point of everything,_ Louis doesn't know.

Harry is actually walking towards Louis now and he stops right in front of him. "Would you mind giving me my daily dose of Louis twice today? Maybe at night? Niall will be coming in later today, and there aren't many customers at night, anyway, so."

 _Bless_ that little Irish boy.

"Like - a date?" 21 year old grown-ups do  _not_ squeak.

"Yeah,  _exactly_ like a date."

"Alright."

"Alright?"

"Alright."

And there's that.

And they talk some more. They talk and talk as Harry works and works but Louis doesn't know if he's just too hyper-aware of Harry or if his mind is just playing more cruel tricks on him again but Harry keeps  _touching_ him and Louis is not generally a very touchy-feely person but Harry is not general, not at all. Harry brushes his arm against his side as he reaches over for the sugar, Harry pats his knee twice when Louis expresses his opinion on Instagram _(fu_ _cking hipster)_ and it could almost pass off as condescending, Harry brushes Louis' chin with his thumb when a bit of flour flies up on Louis and Harry's flour-y thumb makes Louis' chin even more flour-y but Harry barks out a laugh at that and his eyes crinkle and sparkle and Louis really wants to poke his fingers into his dimples (but that's creepy) and Louis thinks that he might be able to live with a flour-y chin, no biggie. _  
_

It's 8am when Louis decides to leave, because he's really trying his darndest to work on his writing in His Booth, but Harry bloody _Styles_ is tending the till and he keeps  _smiling_ at customers and at Louis too, once or twice (okay, maybe more than once or twice), so Louis decides to leave.

There aren't any customers at the counter then, so Louis packs his laptop into his bag and pads over.

"You're leaving already?" A cupcake and a baby deer rolled into one and he happens to be a  _pouter,_ too.  _Okay._

Did Louis mention that his dimples pop even when he pouts? Because they do and it's not exactly fair, is it?

"Yep, I don't wish to fuck up my sleep schedule even more."

"But you do remember that you've promised me my second dose of Louis today, right?"

"And at what time exactly would you expect your second dose of Louis?"

"I'm thinking maybe 6 something? You could come over and we could walk over to my flat together? Maybe? It that's - if that's alright with you."

Louis raises his eyebrows at that. "Your flat?"

"Yeah, a homemade meal and rented movie, always a winner."

"I don't put out on the first date, Styles."

Harry barks out a laugh and he laughs and laughs and his laugh subsides into giggles and Louis swears that there's a pink tinge on his cheeks and he's got butterflies in his stomach that are slightly on the smug side because he's got Harry feeling scandalised, for a change.

"I don't put out on the first date, either, Tomlinson, is that all you've got in that pretty head of yours?"

And he reaches out his right arm to brush the back of his hand over Louis' cheeks, so so ever so gently.

"You've got some flour over there."

But his hands barely touch Louis' cheeks, it's a caress so gentle that one could mistake it for butterfly wings, and Louis is fairly sure that butterfly-wings-barely-there-caresses aren't meant for rubbing flour off someone else's cheeks, and he very much hopes to come up with a witty response, but he's got butterfly wings in his stomach, too, so he decides to keep his mouth shut and just enjoy the butterfly wings, both in his stomach and on his cheek.

"I'll see you later then." The butterfly wings on his cheek has stopped but the butterfly wings in his stomach are slightly more stubborn, Louis thinks.

"Okay, I'll see you later."

"Okay."

"Okay."

So Louis turns around to walk back to his shitty flat and it's cold and he's got the sleep schedule of a bat's but there are boys on this shitty planet with butterfly wings for hands so life isn't really that bad, Louis thinks.

***

Louis reaches the bakery at precisely 6.01pm, with a sweater depicting a cartoon elf greeting him from behind the counter.

"Ayyyy, mate, heard my best mate is finally going to get some! Would you have anything to do with that?"

Louis hears a distinct crash from the kitchen and he's glad that he's not the only one.

"Niall!" Harry walks out from the kitchen and swats Niall on the back of his head and the Irish fucker bends over the counter laughing, grabbing his tummy with both his hands.

So Harry and Louis ignore him and walk out into the cold together, brushing shoulders.

"Would you mind popping over to the store to rent a movie first?" Harry turns around and says and he's got such a childishly excited grin on his face that Louis can't help but smile too.

"Of course."

They walk a bit more to the store and spend a good 15 minutes bickering until they finally decide on The Grinch ("Because your resemblance with him is uncanny and it's a Christmas classic, as you said so yourself.")

It's not exactly a very romantic choice for a first date, but hey, it's a Christmas classic.

And they round a few more streets until they reach Harry's shitty flat, but it's much less shittier than Louis' shitty flat, Louis decides, because there's a gramophone in the living room, and there's nothing less shitty in this world than a gramophone.

"So I was thinking," Harry says as they walk into the living room, "I know you always tell me that you're shit in the kitchen, but, you know, I happen to be quite amazing in the kitchen, if I do say so myself, and I could, you know, teach you how to be less shitty, if that's, if that's alright."

If the fact that he's drawling even more than usual doesn't give away that he actually may be as nervous as Louis, the way he bites his lower lip and the faint pink colourinig his cheeks definitely do. 

"I'm 90% sure that you're doing this to get yourself out from actually having to cook, and I'm 100% sure that you're doing this just to laugh at my nonexistent skills in the kitchen, but yeah, I would be more than glad to become less shitty." 

And there's that smile again and there's those dimples again and there's that  _sparkle_ again.

Harry comes forward suddenly and places his mouth close to Louis' right ear, "As long as your skills in places besides the kitchen are more than satisfactory," he whispers, and jerks back his head just as suddenly as he came forward, deceivingly-innocent smile still intact, pats Louis on the shoulder and claps his hands together, "Chop chop, we've got cooking to do!"

And caveat in place, Harry turns around and  _skips_ into the kitchen, but not before grabbing Louis' hand.

Louis has always been a _milder_  sort of person actually, snarky at times, yes, especially to the people closest to him. But his snarkiness was often conveyed through words, and for some reason or another, he's always been well-liked by the people around him, and he knows that. Louis often thinks that his words were like lightning, all the personality in his body pinpointed in a sentence and unleashed with a flash, and if he were lightning, this whirlwind of a boy currently leading him into the kitchen has surely got to be a tornado, designed to bulldoze it's way into your life and _ruin_ it, basically, whether you liked it or not.

Louis has never in his life taken the words "sweep you off your feet" quite so literally.

Harry is still holding onto his hand as they step into the kitchen, and he's still holding onto his hand when he walks over to the fridge to take out the ingredients for cooking, and he's still holding onto his hand as he reaches for the cooking utensils, and Louis silently thanks his mum for not passing the genes of sweaty palms to him.

"Now, for your very first cooking lesson," Harry says as he sweeps his right hand over the ingredients and utensils placed on the kitchentop with a dramatic flourish (If you're wondering where his left hand has gone, it's still holding on to Louis, hmmm.), "I have wisely decided to choose a slightly easier dish to prepare."

He's got a grin on his face, like he's very pleased with himself, for some reason, and something pings inside of Louis' brain.

"Wait - you've been in the bakery since this morning, you prepared all this beforehand?"

"Yep."

"What if I'd rejected you?" Louis raises an eyebrow.

"Well, the thing is you  _didn't_ , did you, my dear, I haven't got much spare time to dwell on what if's, I've got bread to bake, and all that."

They're looking at each other and Harry's got a grin plastered on his face and suddenly they're both laughing like there's no tomorrow.

"Oh, okay, to tell you the truth, I was  _slightly_ nervous of asking you out," Harry says, "but, you know, I've got Niall as a flatmate, throwing away excess food is not an option in this household. If worse comes to worst, I'll just cook and finish all these by myself like the miserable old sod that I am."

Louis giggles at that, and suddenly Harry's lips are pressed against his forehead in a peck, "But now that you're here, let's focus on the task beforehand."

***

Louis has always been shit in the kitchen, and he still is, but he's never been more thankful for that. Harry finds every one of his misfits in the kitchen absolutely hilarious, and when Harry finds things absolutely hilarious, he laughs, that's the thing.

Louis remembers coming across a quote somewhere before: there comes a time when you meet someone and you just want to make them laugh for the rest of your life, he isn't exactly sure of the reason this particular quote pops into his brain then, but it is what it is.

The dish that Harry is teaching him to cook is chicken wrapped in parma ham stuffed with cheese ("With a scoop of homemade mash, winner!"), and like the fucking hipster that he is, he insists on taking a photo of Louis cooking and posting it on Instagram and Twitter with the caption "Louis' first ever cooking experience". Louis very much wants to protest, but it's Harry, and Harry always gets his way, that's the thing.

The dish turns out to be not bad, if Louis does say so himself, and they end up on the couch together flicking grapes into each other's mouths, for some reason. Harry grabs a handful of grapes and throws them at Louis' face and it results in an indignant "Hey!" from Louis and Louis has seen enough movies and read enough books to know that one of them is going to initiate a kiss sooner or later, but it's Harry, and Harry is a tornado, and tornadoes are never predictable, that's the thing.

So Harry grabs Louis' hand all of a sudden and pulls them up from the couch, and he's still holding onto Louis' hand as he walks over to his iPod dock and plays a song from his playlist.

He owns a bloody gramophone, and -  _okay,_ it's  _Harry._

The song that starts playing from the iPod dock takes Louis aback for a second, because he didn't know that tornadoes listened to this kind of songs.

"Sewn? By The Feeling?" Louis asks as Harry places his hands on Louis' waist and Louis places his hands on Harry's shoulders and they start moving around in circles.

"Yeah, I figured it was fitting."

So they move around the living room and their dance moves are strictly limited to turning around and round in circles together, but Louis' entire being has never felt so light, just like his stomach has never felt so overflown with butterflies (The butterflies might turn out to be Pokémon, actually, because Louis didn't know that butterflies were capable of evolving themselves into rampaging rhinoceroses.)

There isn't a blinding smile on Harry's face, for a change, but his eyes are still doing that twinkling thing as he looks down at Louis, and maybe, just maybe, getting his life ruined by a tornado doesn't sound like such a bad idea after all.

**Author's Note:**

> Wooooooop, I really hope you guys have at least derived some sort of joy from this, even though it may not be the best. I know, I know, it looks unfinished, I've actually got an outline for the following plot (Christmas fluff, maybe some OT5 bromance lovin'?), but, you know, I don't know if I'm actually any good? So leave your thoughts on this, and if I should continue on the next chapter (but if you think it's absolute shit then spare my fragile little heart from the blow, it is my first time after all)
> 
> Regarding their date, the chicken wrapped in parma ham thing is widely known enough, I think, but the reason for the song choice is actually a post that caught my eye on Tumblr, during their X Factor days, Louis himself has actually expressed his love towards this song, and call me a tinhatter all you want, but the lyrics are really beautiful and important, actually, so look up the song on Youtube.
> 
> My tumblr is baby-be-with-me-so-larryly.tumblr.com, and if you would like to talk about anything at all, Larry or non Larry, I would be more than happy to be your friend. Any thoughts on my writing can be sent there too! As well as prompts!
> 
> Thanks loadssssssss <3
> 
> P/S Oh and I really need a name for this fic someone help me with a name! Or is this name okay? I've used up all my brain juice on writing oops


End file.
